Comic 694 - Happy Halloween, 2017

Author Notes:

Heheh... Not what I would've expected or guessed was coming.... This came about from me not being sure what the group-costume would be and Martin playing a lot of Mario Odyssey. ^^ Last week he randomly suggested in a stream we do the Mario cast and hashed things out.

Vespitina showing up here is a nod that she miiight be turning up pretty soon in the comic proper. ^^ Honestly, her exchange with Jake is an odd nod to something we had planned but forgot abuot; at one point we were gonna have Jake spend the haunted-house night at the center going to a costume party Vespi was throwing. Kiiinda worked not doing it since we'd just seen her in the previous chapter and would make it a bit less special for her to turn up immediately after, but still could've been neat.

I had intentionally left Peach out of this picture and Martin suggested making Vespi fit that role so here she is. Also Lore was going to be Pauline until Martin suggested Toadette. Another idea we had planned was the kids all as the various Koopalings and Jake as Bowser (REALLY wanted him in that tux). And Martin typed up an alternate script with the kids as Mario bad-guys....

Out of it all we ended on this one and really like it. ^^ What I love is that it was probably Nicky's choice, and from her expression Val is cool doing it for him. Likewise Grant has no trouble signing up to be Nicky's Luigi since they're best friends.

Yeah, there was a lot of last-minute back and forth about this whole thing. What series to do - we kicked around some things like movie Justice League or Zelda, what to actually do within it, that sort of thing.

Vespitina was pretty much just a last minute, "Hey, it'd be fun to include her," thing that arose in the middle of drawing it. Basically just pitched it as a mix of she'd fit well as Peach and it being a cute little way to work her in in light of the idea for her in the Halloween chapter not ending up making the final cut. Plus like Adam said, she'll be popping up again in the story proper before too long.

Do hope everyone enjoys and be sure to swing by tomorrow for the next page!